This afternoon, the Wolfpack meets last-place Virginia Tech, which took N.C. State into overtime before losing last month in Raleigh, in a first-round game.

A victory would send the Wolfpack into a game against Virginia — the same opponent awaiting a year ago in the quarterfinals.

“Maybe it helped us last year, you never know,” Gottfried said. “We played a game, had a game under our belt. Virginia had not played a game. That may actually have been an advantage for us at that time.”

N.C. State has quite a bit going for it. The Wolfpack is the only team in the country with five players averaging 12 points per game or more. For only the ninth time, an ACC team has four 1,000-point career scorers on the same team.

Gottfried said the Wolfpack had to learn how to deal with the new attention and outside expectations.

“I think we’re getting better,” Gottfried said. “I’m not sure we handled that early in the season, being in a different position than any of our players have ever been in, where we were the hunter (in the past) and not the hunted.”

Of course, today the opponent is an upset-minded team. Gottfried said the regular-season meeting with Virginia Tech wasn’t a case of only Erick Green, the country’s scoring leader, having a good game. It was other Hokies playing well, too.

That first encounter was one of the tight games that ended up in N.C. State’s favor. Those types of situations might have helped the Wolfpack develop in certain areas.

Notes …: N.C. State is 1-1 in previous ACC Tournament meetings with No. 12 seeds. … With 22 victories, the Wolfpack has more victories entering the ACC Tournament than any season since the 1988 tournament. … N.C. State is 21-21 in ACC Tournament games in Greensboro.